Very little went well for the Bills' quarterback in a frustrating game on Thursday evening against the Houston Texans.
Yet he came close to driving the Bills to a win before an late pick in the final minute ended their hopes in a close defeat.
Allen took consecutive tackles for loss on the team's last drive, resulting in a fourth-and-27, but Buffalo (7-4) picked up significant yardage on a quick throw from Josh Allen to Josh Palmer, who flipped a lateral to another teammate.
Following a false-start penalty led to a fourth down situation for Buffalo, Calen Bullock picked off Allen’s pass at the 9-yard line with under half a minute remaining.
We possessed a chance to come out on top there at the end,” Allen said. “Our team performed a good job of staying in it and our defense saved us a few instances. We’ve got figure it out, and we didn’t.”
Proved difficult for the signal-caller to establish rhythm on a night he was sacked a personal-worst on eight occasions and pressured four other times. Allen threw for 253 passing yards with two interceptions and zero scores after producing six TDs in a win over Tampa Bay last week.
Whenever they pressure our quarterback a dozen times, I don’t like that,” Bills coach Sean McDermott said. “I don’t like that statistic at all. It’s just not a safe way to play and it isn't a good way to preserve our quarterback healthy for the remaining games. We need to improve our performance.”
Allen was slow to get up after a tackle in the first half. He said he was fine and that his shoulder “went a little numb” after he fell on it awkwardly. He was asked about being hit so many times on Thursday.
“It’s not fun,” he remarked. “I encountered a few myself. I’ve got to be more effective at disposing of the football. On multiple occasions, I found myself losing ground.”
Allen surrendered 70 yards on the eight quarterback takedowns. Anderson had two and a half sacks to lead the Houston defense. His second one occurred when he almost sacked the QB near the scrimmage line, but he escaped and Anderson got up and pursued him downfield to drop him for an 18-yard loss to force a punt in the third quarter.
The Bills competed for a second straight game without receiver Coleman after he was once more a non-participant after he was late to a squad gathering before their last game. He was earlier benched for the first series of a defeat to the Patriots in Week 5 after also being delayed for a team session.
No change. We are taking it one day at a time,” the coach noted. “I felt he had a improved week, but we are handling it step by step. It wasn’t that it wasn’t thought about, but we went with the guys that provide the best chance.”
Khalil Shakir led the Bills with eight catches for 110 receiving yards and Cook had 116 rushing yards and a touchdown.
The quarterback was frustrated that the team were unable to execute down the stretch.
In the end, we must perform, and we didn’t succeed of that this evening,” he concluded. “No matter the scenario and any condition, we’ve got to find a way, and we came up short.”
